anthony



c. s. ANTHONY & J. MANHEIM.

DEVICE FOR PREVENTING THE ACOUMULATION OF FROST AND STEAM UPON STOREWINDOWS.

No. 190,533. Patented May 8,1877.

UNITED STATES PATENT CHARLES S. ANTHONY AND J AOOB MANHEIM, OF TAUNTON,MASS.

IMPROVEMENT IN DEVICES FOR PREVENTING THE ACCUMULATION 0F FROST ANDSTEAM UPON STORE-WINDOWS.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 190,533, dated May8,1877; application filed February 16, 1877.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that we, CHAS. S. ANTHONY and J A0013 MANHEIM, of the cityof Taunton, in the county of Bristol and State of Massachusetts, haveinvented a new and useful Device for the Purpose of Preventing theAccumulation of Frost and Steam upon Store-Windows-such windows we meanas are cased up and used as show-windows for the display of goodsofwhich the following is a specification:

We give the name of anti-frost pipe to our invention; and the saiddevice is fully set forth in the following specification andaccompanying drawing, in Which-- Figure 1 is a plan of a store-windowwith 1 our anti-frost pipe attached, a portion of the tical plane.

The object of our invention is to remove the source of the seriousinconvenience and loss to which so many merchants are now subjectedduring the winter, owing to the gathering of frost and steam upon theirshow-windows. This accumulation of frozen vapor destroys theirtransparency and makes his showwindows practically useless to themerchant, for they are valuable only as they afford him the means todisplay his wares in an attract ive form to the public.

In the drawing, P is a pipe of sheet metal, suitably fastened to theframework beneath the flooring of the window. One end of the pipe passesthrough the frame-work of the window, and connects with the out-of-doorsair at the point E. At the point E cold air is admitted, and, passingthrough the pipe P, it is thrown up into the window close to the glassthrough the branches B B. The admission of air at the point E isregulated by a slide, and the tops of the branches B B are covered withnetting, to exclude dirt and to prevent the falling into them of smallarticles.

The operation of our device proceeds from the working of well-knownatmospheric laws. By keeping the air inside of the window at as low atemperature as the air without, we prevent the formation of steam andfrost.

In nearly all shop-windows, under ordinary circumstances, watery vapordoes form, condense, and freeze upon the cold glass of the window.

Many attempts have been made to overcome the evil by placing stoves orsteam-pipes in the windows; but neither of these methods has beensuccessful.

In store-windows as commonly constructed, the temperature of the airwithin their inclosure is likely to be raised considerably above that ofthe atmosphere without. When this happens a certain proportion of thewater held, in combination with the air within the window, isprecipitated in the form of vapor. This is in accordance with the law ofnature that air cannot hold in suspension as much water at a highertemperature as it can at a lower. Let this watery vapor strike the glassof the window, cold from direct contact with the air out-of-doors, andat once the glass, until now transparent, becomes opaque, covered thickwith frost.

By our device all the loss andinconvenience which this natural actionoccasions so many merchants are removed thoroughly, simply, and cheaply.

We are aware that it is not new, broadly, to prevent the accumulation offrost and steam upon store-windows by the admission .of cold air, thisbeing shown, for instance, in

the patent to Mason, January 24, 1860. This, therefore, we do not claim;but our invention possesses the advantages of having theregulating-slide E, also the inlet branch pipes B, which, in order toprevent small articles from being lost, are covered with wire-netting,as shown therefore- Having thus described our invention, what we claimas new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-

The combination, with a store-window, of the airsupply pipe 1?, havingbranches B, covered with wire-netting, and supply-regulatii'ig slide E,substantially as and for the purpose shown and specified.

CHARLES S. ANTHONY. JACOB MANHEIM.

Witnesses:

JAMES J. GALLIGAN, WM. R. BILLINGS.

